In December of 2003, seven of us from Robert Siegel's class at UNCW gathered together at a Renga writing party. It was a chilly night, the food was plentiful, the spirit high. We were all squeezed into a tiny apartment on the second floor of Campus Walk, feverishly writing lines of poetry that have long been forgotten. At times, it seemed like the night was endless, and the words were not going to come. I've created a space--it may have already been there and I just answered its call--for us to gather once again across the long distances in order to write rengas. We return to poetry over and over again simply because...